


All the Better to Eat You With

by starkadder



Category: Carmilla (Web Series)
Genre: Biting, Dreams, F/F, Fairy Tales, some smut
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-12-04
Updated: 2015-12-19
Packaged: 2018-05-04 21:40:24
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 5
Words: 15,316
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5349530
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/starkadder/pseuds/starkadder
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Perry is having a disturbing night, and her subconscious won't leave her alone. Through dreams of big bad wolves, wicked stepmothers and castles covered in briars, Matska Belmonde is stalking her. And it's getting increasingly difficult to not enjoy it.</p><p>A collection of Permonde fairy tales.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Cloak and Dagger

Perry draws the curtains against the cold outside and mentally shivers at the sight of the ice-blasted campus. January is not warm at Silas, but there is a good bed to be taken advantage of and an array of coverlets and pillows to sink into. She does so gratefully, and leans across to turn out the bedside light. The room in darkness is still and quiet. All the rooms in the Dean's house seem to be well protected against intruding noise, which is probably a good thing given the inhabitants of some of the other rooms and their night-time activities. Not that she's jealous.

Lying there in the dark, she is left at the mercy of her insistent mental checklists. Things that have been cleaned recently and things that have not been cleaned recently. Things that can be cooked with ingredients already in the kitchen and things that cannot be cooked unless supplies are found. People who said pleasant things to her today and people who said unpleasant things. Chief in the latter list is Matska Belmonde.

Things that she does not like about Matska Belmonde: her smoothly arrogant manner, her insolent beauty, her contempt for Perry. Also the fact that she is a bloodthirsty vampire who probably killed those kids at the newspaper. Although the latter is the more over-arching of the reasons to dislike her, the former reasons are somehow more pressing. Perry fumes as she lies there. People are easier to like when they're not so effortlessly superior. Not that Matska actually is superior, of course. Not in a moral sense. But that makes it all worse. 

Running through the list of things that Matska does that make her knuckles turn white, Perry drifts into sleep. Her thoughts stretch out, sentences remain unfinished. Crowding around the edges of the events of the day are memories of her family in Frankfurt, walks she has taken with LaFontaine, whether she should have got down the furs from the attic to make her bed extra warm...

* * *

“You take this basket to your grandmother,” her father tells her, passing over the bundle of food stuffs all covered over with a blanket. Lola nods. “And remember to ask her whether her eiderdown is keeping her warm. And make sure her log pile is stacked.” Lola nods again and turns to go.

“And don't stray from the path,” her father adds, as Lola mimes the words along with him. He says them every time and she has never disobeyed, nor had any reason to.

She throws her great red cloak around her, and makes sure the carving knife is securely fastened in her belt. She has never met anybody on the path to her grandmother's cottage in the woods except the occasional village boy hoping to charm her – or possibly grab an apple from her hoard – but nevertheless she takes it each time.

The afternoon is still young as she steps onto the path leading out of the village into the woods at its edge. On the south side, there are fields for a good mile before the woods close in, but her grandmother lives to the north where the shoulders of the mountain begin to slide upwards. It is gently uphill all the way, but not such that she will need to catch her breath.

As she steps under the first tree, she glances as always at the wolf pelt nailed to the large tree looming across the path like a sentry. It is always the same pelt, though she has been walking this way for years. When her parents first let her make the journey alone it had been less than a year old and only the personal assurances of the expert hunters who had been brought in to exterminate the pack could have persuaded her father to let her go. Now it is ragged and mouldy, the paws fallen off and the hair patchy. There has not been a wolf sighted for four years now.

She thinks about wolves every time she walks the path. Her father is a practical man and to him a wolf is a menace, but it is a menace that can be dealt with and that is that. Her mother, on the other hand, is full of tales about men whose eyebrows meet in the middle and who run off into the forest on full moons to tear off their clothes and howl at the sky. She raises her own eyebrows with a smile when she talks about this, but Lola cannot see what is so entertaining about a man running around the woods, clothes or not.

When she went down to the big town last summer there was a little play being performed in the market square about a girl who married a strange man who her family disapproved of. One day, not long after the wedding, he disappeared into the night and they all tutted and said how sorry they were and then quietly told each other how unsurprised they were. And after some time, when everybody had given him up for dead and the girl was beginning to catch the eyes of other men, a fine gentleman came riding into the village on his white horse. And he tossed the girl a sixpence for the drink she gave him, and one thing led to another, and at the end of the day he carried her back to his great house.

But as they were just about to arrive and darkness was falling, a great howling went up around them and from out of the fog came a pack of the largest wolves you ever saw. They tore the gentleman to pieces and when he and his horse were a red stain on the ground the largest of the wolves tore his furry coat off and there was her husband again. And he struck her for her faithlessness – at which point the actors took a bow and their chief told the watching crowd that the moral of the story was to listen to your family and keep faith with the way things were done. But Susan muttered to Lola that the moral should really be 'don't run off with suspicious bastards' and Lola had such a fit of the giggles that Susan had to grab her firmly by the hand and drag her somewhere quieter.

Lola wonders why she has never heard a story about a wolf who is also a woman. Probably because women are too sensible to go running round the woods with their clothes off.

“Red cloak girl,” says a voice from behind her, “you look familiar. Have I seen you before?”

Lola spins round in shock and there on the path not six feet away from her is the most extraordinary woman she has ever seen. She has skin a deep brown colour, and long hair as black as could be, and eyes dark like ink. And she is smiling like she has seen a joke somewhere on Lola's face.

“Who are you?” she asks in alarm. The woman only smiles broader – she has very bright, white teeth – and takes a step closer. He feet are bare and muddy, Lola notices, which is strange because she is clad in an extraordinarily fine dress of russet and dark green. But a dress that ends not even below the level of her knees, and which clings to her body and has hardly any thickness. She does not seem to be cold.

“Have you lost your way?” Lola asks, trying to think of a reason such a woman might be here.

The woman takes another step forward, so that she is only inches away from Lola. She tilts her head slightly to each side as she inspects Lola.

“I do believe I just found it,” she answers languidly, and steps around Lola to inspect her from behind.

“When did you come onto the path?” asks Lola. “You weren't following me when I left the village, were you?” The woman laughs.

“No, darling. I stepped onto this little track oh, half a second before I saw you. A lucky fortune for me,” she adds as she completes the circuit and comes back to look Lola face on. Lola is aware increasingly of the woman's scent, musky and woody and somehow suggestive of strength and speed.

“My name is Matska,” the woman introduces herself at last. “And who are you, little red?”

“I'm Lola,” she mutters. Something about this woman is upsetting her. “I'm on my way to see my grandmother,” and she gestures vaguely at the path up the hill.

“By that path?” asks the woman dismissively. “Left and right and twice as long as you need, Why not come through the wood with me?”

“I would get lost,” Lola says sensibly. “The forest is large and my grandmother's house is small.”

The woman – Matska – come so close to Lola's cheek that when she speak she can feel breath tickling her. “Oh, but you wouldn't get lost if you were with me, dear Lola. I can run straight as an arrow through the bush and the bramble and still find my way. Come with me and I'll show you.” But Lola shakes her head. “Very well,” Matska continues. “I'll prove it to you! I bet you that I can find your grandmother's house before you do. And I'll do it without following the path.”

“What do you bet me?” asks Lola. Her voice is small and soft and seems to fade away in front of the imposing woman.

“Bet you... your heart's desire,” the woman offers. “You find the house before me and I'll give you whatever you desire.”

“And if you find it first?”

“You give me a kiss,” Matska states firmly. Lola blushes.

“That doesn't seem fair somehow,” she objects.

Matska raises an eyebrow. “Depends what your heart's desire is, darling. Moot point, though. See you at your grandmother's house.” And with that she plunges into the forest, long legs striding until she is lost in the trees.

As she walks on to her grandmother's house, Lola thinks about the singular woman. She hopes that when she meets her later – whichever of them gets there first – she will have a chance to find out more about her. Matska is clearly a well-off woman even if she does wander around in dresses that expose her legs like that. Perhaps that means she is the kind of woman her mother describes as 'no better than she should be', which is not a phrase that Lola has ever understood. She wonders how she would look in such a dress, but is immediately distracted by the thought of what everyone in the village would say if she turned up in that manner.

Can Matska get there first? Lola cannot doubt that if the race were entirely along the path that she would. Her whole body, the way she moved and held herself spoke of strength and power. But there is also the forest to consider. The afternoon is not through yet, but Lola expects the sky to be darkening by the time she arrives. So unless Matska is very much faster than her, she will be fumbling through a shadowy expanse of undergrowth by the end. Can she see in the dark as well? Given the way she seemed to see through and into Lola like nobody else, she probably can.

She considers what her heart's desire might be, so that she is prepared to demand it from Matska. She can certainly think of a number of things that she would like – a new frying pan, a better pair of winter boots, eyes like Elsie's – but none seems of quite the magnitude to warrant being called her heart's desire. But then of course Matska couldn't grant that anyway even if she knew what it was. Maybe she should just ask for a kiss as well in order to be fair. She hasn't the faintest idea why Matska might want to kiss her but it doesn't seem a terrible idea.

It is indeed becoming quite dark by the time Lola comes round the bend of the path to see her grandmother's cottage. It is a small place, but well protected from the winds and the windows are already lit up to guide her in. The gate is open and she stamps off her boots on the stone step before knocking on the door.

“Who's there?” asks a muffled voice from within.

“Only your grand-daughter,” Lola replies.

“Lift up the latch and walk in.” The knocking is a courtesy only. There is nobody else in this corner of the forest and her grandmother is always at home.

Inside the small cottage a fire is burning in the grate, the cuckoo clock ticks in the mantlepiece, and Matska is sitting in the rocking chair. She smiles broadly when Lola meets her eyes.

“So. You did get here first,” says Lola.

“Been here for a while, Lola dear. Come closer.” Lola takes a step forward. Matska has a dark stain on the corner of her mouth that was not there before.

“Where's Granny?” she asks.

“Gone to the woodpile to fetch more logs. Come closer.” Lola takes another step forward until she comes almost close enough to touch Matska's arm on the rocking chair. She can see other dark stains on her fingers and under the nails.

“Rude not to help her,” she says pertly, and the woman smirks.

“Oh, I wanted to wait here for you, my dear. Come closer,” and Lola can see the fire dancing in her dark, dark eyes as she places her foot on the hearthstone. Something crunches under her boot.

Lifting her foot to see, Lola finds the shattered remains of her grandmother's spectacles. Her heart suddenly racing, she looks up at Matska's expression, then jumps back.

“Is that all you left of her?” she spits. Matska rises, stretching out and unfolding into the corners of the room. “Heavens, what big arms you have!”

“All the better to hold you with, darling” replies Matska. She advances, bringing her face close in towards Lola's just as she did on the path. Once again Lola can smell her intoxicating scent of musk and wood, can see her powerful chest rising and falling with each breath, can watch herself quail in the woman's eyes.

“Heavens, what big eyes you have!” she whispers. 

“All the better to see you with, my dear.” Matska smiles broadly, her white teeth standing out perfectly against the mahogany of her skin. Some of those teeth and sharper and longer than Lola remembers.

“Heavens, what big teeth you have!” Lola cries, and grabs at her carving knife, but Matska laughs to see the weapon that seems merely a toy in front of such force.

“All the better to eat you with,” she growls, and Lola lunges for her. Matska catches her hand effortlessly and squeezes until she drops the knife on the carpet.

“Now now, little Lola. That's not the way.” Matska does not let her go, but advances further, backing her up against the wall. Lola feels the wooden barrier at her back and there is nowhere to go. Matska leans in, her body pinning Lola's to the wall.

“What part of Hell did you spring from?” she whispers.

“I don't come from Hell, Lola. I come from the forest,” she purrs. 

“Your eyebrows don't even meet in the middle,” Lola notices. Even in the flickering light of from the fireplace she can see how polished and perfect is each feature of Matska's face. 

“You made me a promise, Lola,” Matska reminds her. “I always keep my promises. Do you keep yours?” They are pressed so close now that Lola swears she can feel the beating of the other woman's heart against her own breast. Matska's eyes are driving into her own and the world shrinks to the penny width between them.

Lola nods. “Always,” she whispers.

“That's a very nice cloak you have, Lola.” Matska runs her fingers over her shoulder, and then down her arm. “But surely it's warm in here, with the fire. Shall I take it off?” Trembling, Lola nods again and Matska tears the fastening at her neck. Slowly, trapped between Lola and the wall, the cloak slides down to the floor.

One of Matska's hands combs through Lola's hair and wraps around her neck. “Will you pay me the promise you made me?”

“Yes,” she breathes. Matska places her other hand on Lola's collarbone, and then slowly moves it downward to lie over her breast. Lola can feel a warmth beginning to spread inside her, radiating out from the woman's touch. Gently, very gently, Matska's thumb starts to circle the wool of her blouse just over Lola's nipple.

“Will you give me what you owe me?” Matska asks softly, her lips now brushing over Lola's cheek. Lola gasps, and then Matska suddenly brings both her hands round to grasp at Lola's blouse and rip it in two. It takes no effort on her part and Lola takes ragged breath after ragged breath, standing there pushed up against the wall with her now bare chest heaving.

“Yes,” she manages to half-say, half-sigh. And Matska, smiling a smile that sinks straight into her very skin, presses her lips to Lola's. Her mouth is hot and tastes of things Lola does not yet have names for, and as Matska bites down on her lower lip she lets out a moan-

* * *

Perry jolts awake suddenly, and realises the sound that awoke her had come from her own mouth. The memories of the dream come pouring back in. Even in the dark she feels her eyes widen in shock. What on earth is her subconscious playing at? 

Just a dream, she reassures herself. No doubt there'll be another one along in a moment, quite different. She settles back into the pillows, letting the muted sound of the wind outside lull her down into sleep again.


	2. Glass and Chains

Perry lets herself settle down into sleep again. As she hugs her arms around her chest and fiddles with the fraying threads in her pyjama cuff, she notes that an icicle is forming outside the window, visible in a small gap in the curtains. It is like fine crystal glass, she thinks...

* * *

“Careful with the soup,” her stepmother reminds her. “You know how you burned it twice last week” Lola nods. As a matter of fact she has not burned the soup since she was thirteen, but her stepmother always will find something to complain about and she is simply glad that it isn't anything more serious.

“And don't think you can go slacking off while we're at the ball!” her stepmother continues. “I shall be making a doubly close inspection first thing in the morning and I expect the whole house to be spotless.” Lola nods again. This extra inspection does not worry her. However much or little she cleans the house, her stepmother always finds exactly three things wrong with it; Lola therefore manages things in her own way and schedules time to deal with whatever her stepmother has decided will be wrong this time.

“Oh, and Lola? It is not seemly for a girl your age to be covered in cinders from the fire. You must take more care.” Lola nods once more, never meeting the woman's eyes. It is better this way. Best not to draw any attention this night.

When her stepmother is gone and Lola has but the kitchen in order, she creeps upstairs to her space in the attic. Her stepmother will be getting ready, she knows, and her two stepsisters also. That gives her maybe an hour of freedom.

Her cramped space in the attic with its thin mattress lying on the floor and boxes instead of drawers has one lonely advantage: it has a skylight. And she is tall enough to, with the aid of a box, lift herself up out of it and stand on the roof. Often times she comes up here to look at the stars, but tonight a more subtle plan is in motion. Carefully she walks along the trough between two gables, crouching low when she passes any other lit-up skylight unless somebody should be looking out. After traversing the length of the house she comes to the very edge, standing on the precipice of a four-storey drop. 

“Psst!”

Across from her in the next door house separated by only a few meters is her friend Laura, leaning out of her own high-up window and looking very excited. Lola waves back.

“Have you got it?” she asks, trying to keep her voice low.

“Of course! Ready to catch?” And Laura lifts up a rope with a heavy wooden block tied to the end.

“Careful!” hisses Lola. Laura hoists the wooden block then, with a cautious underarm throw, lobs it towards her waiting hands. There is a moment when she fear she hasn't caught it, but juggling with her fingers she manages to stabilise the block. Quickly she unties the rope from it, and then lashes it close around the nearest gutter. Shooting Laura a thumbs-up, she neatly drops the piece of wood over the fence into the other girl's garden.

“We're good,” Laura tells her, and picks up her own end of rope to reveal a large package tied together and securely affixed to it. 

“Laura, you are brilliant. Thank you so much for doing this,” Lola says.

“No worries – I'm your fairy godmother, right?” She beams happily.

“You can't be my godmother, I'm older than you, silly little thing. Now quickly!” Lola pulls in as much of the rope as she can until it leaves Laura's outstretched arms and it drops. She hauls it up until the whole thing is gathered safely in her arms and then unties the rope from its place on the gutter. One more thumbs up to the widely grinning Laura and she scrambles back across the rooftop to her skylight.

The package contains a great mess of tissue paper covering a dress of the most lovely blue silk, a pile of jewellery and accessories, a pair of shoes with much higher heels than Lola is used to wearing, and a mask. It is not a mask particularly of anything, simply a highly-sequined piece of costumery, with colours centred around the same blue of the dress. Lola grins to herself, checks the time, and tucks everything carefully under her bed before trotting downstairs to arrange the carriage for her stepmother and sisters.

They are going to a ball – Lola is going to a different ball. While they make arch remarks with dull aldermen and faded generals, Lola shall be having a lovely time next door at Laura's father's birthday, to which she has been invited by the kindly old man. Lord Hollis would never be so rude as to publicly offend the second Mrs Perry, but he takes a considerable glee in helping her stepdaughter evade her restrictions, and only part of that is on account of doting on his daughter. The occasional masked balls are a quirk of his, a preference picked up in his youth when all things Venetian were popular and he has never really let it go. 

When the second Mrs Perry, accompanied by the second and third Miss Perrys, have been duly dispatched, Lola runs upstairs as fast as she can to dress. The attic is not exactly built for elegantly twirling around and admiring oneself, but she does her best and for someone who likes to stump around in country knitwear Laura is a surprisingly good judge of what looks good on a woman. By eight o'clock she is prepared. The mask covers her face from the bridge of the nose upwards.

The ball is perhaps badly-named. There is certainly a ballroom and there is certainly dancing, but Lord Hollis's friends are largely drawn from the worlds of academia and collecting of fine artworks, the net result of which is that there are a great number of people engaged in discussions of his latest acquisitions and not many people who cut fine figures when waltzing. One exception is a small dark-haired young woman wearing a mask of a great black cat whom Laura seems unable to take her eyes off.

Lola does not begrudge her friend latching onto somebody else a bit for the evening. In truth simply getting out of her stepmother's house is a prime way to spend an evening and she drifts around making small talk with those few people she has an acquaintance with. She does not often meet people since her social engagements are limited to those occasions when both her stepmother and Lord Hollis are entertaining, but she knows a few here and there. Before long, she spots Lord Hollis himself – his mask is a none-too-convincing representation of a bear – chatting in the corner to a gaggle of people. She drifts over to pay her respects.

“Ah, Miss Perrodon!” He greets her, and takes her hand as he bows. 'Perrodon' is her codename for the night, in case anybody should mention meeting 'Miss Perry' in front of company who shouldn't know.

“Lord Hollis, thank you for inviting me. And arranging all... this.” He shrugs happily.

“Always a pleasure, Miss Perrodon. And allow me to introduce you to two friends of mine I don't think you have met. Here is Baron Vordenberg,” an elderly man with a cane and highwayman's small black mask sweeps a bow, “and this is Ms. Matska Belmonde.”

“Call me Mattie,” she smiles, and does something approximating a curtsey.

Lola cannot but stare at her. There are plenty of elegant women at the ball, but Ms. Belmonde outshines them all. She smiles broadly at Lola from below her black sequinned mask trimmed with feathers. Her gaze takes in the whole of Lola from her shoes right up to the tips of her curled hair.

“How do you do, Mattie,” she says politely. There is a moment of silence before Baron Vordenberg collars Lord Hollis with a question about recent Sumerian discoveries and Lola realises she will have to make conversation with Mattie unaided.

“Lovely, um, weather we're having,” she offers.

“Oh, do not talk to me about the weather, Miss Perrodon, Whenever people talk to me about the weather I feel quite sure they mean something different.” She arches her eyebrows while saying this and Lola feels obscurely that she should be blushing, although she is not sure why.

“And do you?” Lola asks. A long slow smirk appears on Mattie's mouth.

“No, Miss Perrodon. I talk about whatever it is I mean to talk about.” Her voice is quiet, intense.

“And what do you want to talk about?”

“You, I think, Miss Perrodon. For example, what is your name? Your first name? 'Perrodon' is so clunky a moniker, don't you think?”

“I'm Lola”

“Well Lola, and I'm sure you don't mind me calling you that, I have been looking out for a guide to this wonderful labyrinth all evening. You I think have been here before?” Lola nods. “Show me around, would you?” 

And such is the manner in which she asks the question and so befuddling is the waft of perfume that washes over Lola when she says it, that Lola finds herself agreeing at once and, taking Mattie's offered arm, leads her from the room to commence with the Assyrian Room. As they leave she sees Laura waltzing with the cat-masked girl and feels a brief stab of envy at how entranced she looks. Even through her mauve mask Lola can see how she must be feeling.

The Assyrian Room is given a few comments by Mattie, and the Venetian Room a few more positive ones, but mostly she asks Lola about herself. Normally Lola dreads these questions because it is not easy to avoid giving away your identity when being plied with the normal enquiries about where one lives and to whom one is related. But Mattie is interested in other things, it seems. Which of the two sulky-looking women in the corner does Lola suspect would be prettiest under the mask? Does Lola have a suitor? What does Lola dream about?

The tour winds its way through the main rooms on the ground floor and progresses through the less used chambers further up. There are still interesting features to be noted, but the great bulk of the party has been left behind. Now it is Mattie's turn to offer information about herself and to Lola it is endlessly fascinating. She describes the markets of Morocco, the strange rituals of remote parts of Britain, tales of wild romance from Russia. It is all so very different from Lola's own life and yet so wonderfully realised that she begins to wonder if she really does have another life to go back to or if it is only an insubstantial dream.

Finally they come to a small, rarely visited drawing room which Lola has always liked because it offers to her mind a splendid view of the mountains in the distance. She points them out to Mattie, who smiles and makes a non-committal comment.

Suddenly Mattie spins her around to look her in the face and before Lola can say anything Mattie's lips are on hers and she is caught in her embrace. She melts into it. And as she melts, she can feel Mattie's hands moving across her. From her shoulder to her waist and then around behind her, exploring wherever they go. She can feel them as if they are white-hot, burning her through her dress.

And then Mattie is behind her, lips running up and down her neck as her hands trace their course across Lola's torso and over her breasts. She sighs as they cup each in turn and Mattie's long slender fingers tease at their points. And Lola's breathing comes faster and faster as her hands take hold of the train of her dress and lift it up before loosing themselves on her thighs and-

“No, Mattie. Stop,” Lola stiffens suddenly and Mattie's hands reappear on her shoulders.

“And there I was thinking you were enjoying yourself.” Mattie's voice seems teasing, but there is an undercurrent of disappointment.

“I was. I am. But- this isn't what I'm meant to be doing. It doesn't fit into my life. I mean, a little sneaking out here and there to dance and have a glass of champagne fine, but all this-”

“Darling, 'meant to be doing' means nothing unless you are the one doing the meaning. Give it up, whatever it is.” Lola looks at her sharply, unsure of what she means. “Come with me. I'm in town for the next month and then it's home to Morocco. Why don't you come with me for a while?”

“I... can't. I have to stay here.”

“Do you like it here, Lola?”

“Well... no. I just- things are normal here. And I don't have a very good lot, but things are the way they're meant to be. And all this, all you and your... it's nice, it's really nice but I can't. I'm sorry.”

Mattie sighs. “One last kiss before I return you to your life?” Lola manages a wan smile and nods.

The clock chimes loudly and she starts.

“It's midnight!” she cries in shock. “Mattie, I've got to go. No, no time for fond farewells, get off!” She desperately starts straightening out her clothes and making sure her mask in in place.

“Lola,” calls Mattie as she is about to walk out the door. “When you get tired of being normal and decide my offer is more attractive, wear this.” She tosses something shiny across the room and Lola catches it. In too much of a hurry to inspect it she runs out.

 _We haven't even seen each other under our masks_ , she thinks.

She makes it back home just in time to switch her finery for rags before her stepmother is at the door and demanding she take care of her drunken stepsisters. 

Not until much later is she alone in her bed and able to take a look at what Mattie has given her. It is a necklace on a gold chain, the pendant made of a sparkling clear stone. Obviously not a diamond, but some finely-cut crystal glass. It is a curious form, a curling seashell with a hole cut into it on one side that looks strangely familiar. After a few moments confusion a memory comes back to her of a holiday with her father when she was very small and he yet unmarried. They gathered shells on the beach – whelks and mussels and limpets. Mattie has given her a glass slipper limpet.

The next week passes in a haze of boredom and work. It is in fact not very different from most other weeks, but Lola's encounter at the ball has given her the greatest contrast yet between what her life is and what it could be. Even tasks which previously were almost pleasant become unendurable. She keeps her glass slipper limpet in her pocket always and never wears it openly.

“You'll need to put an extra cup and plate out for tea today,” her stepmother informs her on one afternoon a week after the ball. “We have a guest. And she's quite the smart and fashionable one, so no smudges or crumbs left lying around.” Lola nods, and starts to make the little sandwiches for afternoon tea.

The bell rings and Lola bustles off to admit the guest. She tugs the door open and-

“Matksa Belmonde for Mrs Perry. I'm expected.” It's her. Lola backs away in shock, but Mattie takes this for an invitation to enter and steps inside. Suddenly Lola remembers her manner and helps her off with her coat.

“You. Serving girl. You look familiar. Have I see you somewhere before?” Mattie grasps Lola's wrist and Lola is about to reveal herself when her stepmother comes in and welcomes Mattie to her home. She motions Lola to run along and get the tea things.

She places the tea things on the tray and tries to think. Then the retrieves the glass necklace from her pocket and slips it over her head. Heart beating, she pushes open the door to serve her step-family and their guest.

She does not dare to look at anyone while setting the places and it is only when everything is laid out that she raises her eyes to look at Mattie. She is wearing a smile of satisfied amusement, her dark eyes flicking between the necklace and Lola's face. Quickly, Lola shoots a glance at her stepmother who has also seen it and is pursing her lips. No doubt she will be subject to questioning later.

Lola stands up. “I thought I might dust the Green Drawing-Room, ma'am. At the top of the stairs on the left.”

“Yes, yes. Get on with it, then,” her stepmother dismisses her.

Waiting in the Green Drawing-Room is agonising. The clock is ticking and each second seems to Lola like a refusal. Finally, after an age there is the sound of footsteps on the stair and the door moves noiselessly open. Mattie smiles that dazzling wide smile.

“Lola. You kept it.”

She wants to say something, to tell Mattie about how her life was unendurable and about her need for escape but the words don't come. Instead she stutters forward, throws herself into the arms that are waiting for her and raises her mouth to be kissed.

Mattie's kiss is at once the culmination of the frustrations and desires that have built up over the last week, and the first small stones that begin an avalanche. Mattie's hands are at her shoulders, and then her waist, and then they are pushing her backwards and hoisting her onto a table. 

“Now what were we doing before we were so rudely interrupted?” she breathes and Lola gasps as Mattie hikes up her cinder-stained skirt and slides her hand between her legs. Pleasure blossoms outwards and more so when she tugs the last obstacle out of the way and those long slender fingers are insider her and Lola is crying out and collapsing on her shoulder at the sensation as they move in and out and reach-

Her family is probably wondering where Mattie has got to and debating whether it is entirely within the mores of fashionable society to hunt somebody down within your own home, but Lola can feel the worries she would normally be experiencing melt away into insignificance. She hops down, spins Mattie around and now it is her turn to kiss and tug at clothes.

Mattie's breasts are warm and each kiss Lola plants against them seems to fill her head with more and more of that befuddling perfume. And now, eyes fixed on Mattie's and hands already running up her long smooth legs, Lola sinks to her knees and-

* * *

-Perry jolts into awareness as her whole body twitches. She can feel the heat in her cheeks, and not just in her cheeks. There is a flooding warmth throughout her body. It felt so real. Matska's voice and lips and smooth legs. She takes a few deep breaths to calm down, then flicks on the light and jumps out of bed to inspect herself in the mirror.

“Get a hold of yourself, Lola,” she tells her reflection. But her reflection simply looks back at her with wide eyes and flushed cheeks.

Back into bed she creeps, and turns off the lights once more. A momentary temptation crosses her mind but she curls her hands on top of the covers and closes her eyes.


	3. Thorn and Apple

Perry tries to calm down and not to dwell on how much on edge her face had looked in the mirror. There is still plenty of time until dawn, these dreams have been coming fast. She curls up in the covers as small as she can and tries not to think about having to face a certain person when she wakes...

* * *

The castle door is covered in vines and yields only reluctantly to her push inwards. She slips through quietly and finds herself in a courtyard where the omnipresent creepers have thrown limbs and tangles to each other overhead. The ground crunches with dry fallen leaves but there is no other sound in the cold stillness. None of the lead-crossed windows facing inward reveals a lamp or a face.

After trying a few doors, one at the far end proves most willing to open to Lola's push. Inside, the smell of dust and dryness prevails. She is in a sitting room, all velvet and brocade filled with a spilling clutter of jewel-like oddities. Precariously leaning lampshades stand on innumerable tables surrounded by enamelled boxes; baroque ornaments keep watch on the edges of bookcases and mantlevpieces; half-open scrapbooks lie on every cushion and chair.

She drifts through the room slowly. Here is an array of photographs, all sepia-toned. Here are frames full of dusty butterflies affixed to the backboard by glass-beaded pins. She nudges with her foot a great wooden bear that serves as a doorstop. The brass light switches have no effect, and with the windows covered in the tangled vines there is little to see with. In summer, when the leaves screen out even that, this room must be oppressively dark.

One table gives her pause – upon the green baize is laid a pattern of little pasteboard cards painted in bright colours. She picks one up. _La Tour Abolie_ , a lightning-struck tower from which fall despairing victims. _Reine de Batons, La Papesse, Les Amoreaux_.

At the rear of the room is another door that swings open silently to her enquiring touch. The hallway outside is wood-panelled, richly-carpeted. With each step she feels her feet sink into the pile. The corridor curls round the base of a great dark wood staircase and as she climbs she can see hints of the sky peeking through the criss-crossed window.

In the alcove beneath the window is a spinning wheel. Like everything else in the castle it is old and dusty, yet well-preserved otherwise. She runs her hand over the smooth wood, turns the wheel gently. Her finger traces the carved patterns on the frame, right up to the spindle-

“Ouch!” she exclaims aloud. A drop of blood oozes from her index finger – the spindle is extremely sharp. She sucks the blood off her finger and continues up the stairs. At the top she pauses, once again sucking the blood away, and chooses the left-hand doorway.

This room is bathed in light, quite unlike the other rooms. The large windows are utterly clear and they illuminate brightly the great bed upon which lies a woman. She is uncovered, dressed in deep reds that complement her darkly polished skin. Her black hair is neat, not a hair out of place as it lies over her shoulders. 

Lola approaches slowly. The woman's hands are folded on her chest, and she is not sure if she can see a faint rising and falling or whether it is her imagination. She draws up to the bed a small wooden chair and bends over the occupant. Her cheek feels no breath when she lowers it to hover over the woman's lips. Carefully she extends a hand and strokes her face. The skin is cool, but not cold. Lola hesitates. There is still the taste of blood in her mouth from when she cut her finger on the spindle. But she bends forward and grazes the sleeping woman's lips with her own.

As she lifts her face away she feels the woman exhale. A sigh escapes her lips and Lola's gaze flicks up to see her eyes slowly open. There is a small red stain on her bottom lip transferred from Lola's own and her tongue laps it away. Under Lola's apprehensive gaze the woman breaks out into a wide smile.

Suddenly she takes hold of Lola by her neck and draws her in to continue the kiss. Lola sinks forward, the rough embroideries of the covers under her hands as she leans on the bed. The woman's tongue parts her lips and she allows herself to be toppled forward to tangle in the waiting limbs.

“You do know how to wake a girl up, darling,” the woman purrs when they break the kiss at last. Her voice is soft and smooth and utterly confident.

“What's your name?” Lola asks her, brushing a wisp of black hair out of her face.

“You can call me Mattie. And I can call you..?” The woman – Mattie - responds to Lola's gesture by drawing a long finger down her cheek and stroking her bottom lip. The touch leaves sparks in its wake.

“Lola.”

Mattie finds her hand and raises it above their heads to look at the puncture mark. “How did you cut your finger, Lola?” Her mouth dwells on the name.

“There was a spinning wheel. I touched the spindle and it was very sharp.” Mattie lowers their joined hands and kisses the wound.

“If you touch sharp things, you'll get hurt.” There is flirtation in Mattie's voice, but also something more serious – a warning?

“I was curious.”

“Curiosity killed the cat, Lola.”

“Satisfaction brought it back,” she completes the proverb.

“Are you always curious about things that might hurt you?”

“You know how people will tell you the plate is hot and you shouldn't touch it? And then you touch it to see if they were right?”

“Is that why you came here?” Mattie raises herself on an elbow to look at Lola, who does not answer. She does not know why she came here – the question does not even trouble her mind. “You're not scared, are you Lola?” It is a statement of fact coming from her, not a question or a search for reassurance.

Lola shakes her head, and watches as Mattie opens her mouth to reveal extending fangs. She has never seen anything so beautiful. Mattie rolls her body to lie partially on top of Lola's. Strands of fine black hair fall into her eyes and slowly she lowers her mouth onto Lola's neck.

Lola can feel the points of her teeth making small dimples over her pulse point. She breathes in deeply, then slowly out again. She lets her legs drift apart slightly and Mattie places one of her own between them.

Mattie bites down and Lola feels sharp pain mixed with bodily panic as her windpipe is crushes. But then the initial pressure is over and Mattie sucking and lapping up the blood flowing out of the wound sets off a shiver all the way down her spine to resonate deep in her core. It grows and spreads, and she arches her neck to give Mattie more.

The shiver builds to an incessant strumming. She can hear herself moaning aloud, and in some distant corner of consciousness she knows that her hips are desperately rubbing themselves against Mattie's intervening thigh, but all that is being blotted out by her network of nerves resonating to the rhythmic movement of those lips as she is drained dry.

* * *

_  
In her faint, she is dreaming of a mirror. She looks into it and the pedlar woman tells her that a pretty face such as hers deserves a gift. She offers an apple, and Lola looks at it with sudden concern. Her friends told her not to eat anything offered her by a stranger. But the apple is so inviting and it has been a long time since the last harvest. And the woman has been so good to her before, with gifts of a new bodice, and a fine comb to pull through her torrent of curls. The woman is beautiful, and Lola thinks that she would rather see how her lips taste than the apple._

_“Don't you trust me?” the pedlar asks. Lola half makes to take the fruit, but then hesitates and draws back. It is a perfect specimen, half green and half red._

_“Tell you what,” the woman says with a flash of her dazzling smile. “I'll eat half of it first – so you know it's all right. How about that?” Lola nods, relieved that she understands. She takes a large bite of the green side of the apple and, smiling appreciatively, hands it to Lola._

_Lola bites into the red half, sharp and crunchy, and is about to swallow when the world becomes very still. She closes her eyes and feels no reason to open them. She feels herself picked up, lain down on the ground with limbs neatly straightened out. It is slightly damp earth, and there are small stones under her back, but they disturbs her no more than if they were underneath a mattress. She can hear the pedlar's footsteps as she leaves._

_It is all so peaceful. After a little while there are voices around her, but they don't cause any worries. Some of them are familiar. After a little while longer , the voices are gone and there is just quiet. Lola drifts, her body comfortable on the ground, with only the slightest tickle in her throat from the piece of apple still not swallowed. The light on her eyelids fades, and a breeze blows around her. She lets the rhythmic cycle of the light growing and fading absorb her._

_She grows adept at listening. She is able to pick out the fall of a single leaf when the weather turns cold. The cold does not bother her – she merely knows that it is cold. In the spring, she can hear the soft shoots of the new growth pushing up through the soil around her. They unfurl with little sparks of sound._

_After some time, her eyes are shaded more from the sun's glare. The soft shoots around her have become tough briars and the brambles put out leaves that cover her from the light of midday. She hears the briars put forth flowers whose petals fall to the ground with whispers. Their roots writhe deep in the earth below her and pierce the long-emptied bodies of the forest dead._

_At last, from very far off, she can hear somebody coming. They pant and struggle, and with deafening crashes they cut away the forest that has grown around her. The sun grows very hot on her brow, and for the first time in a life-age she does not feel quite calm. Suddenly there is shade over her, and somebody shakes her, rolls her over. The piece of apple falls from her mouth and she starts coughing and choking as each ragged breath is drawn deeper than she is used to. She comes shakily to her feet and regards the young girl who has disturbed her rest. She looks familiar, like somebody she knew before, and yet not so. Perhaps a family resemblance._

_Lola goes out into the world, and finds it changed. She finds nobody she knew before, and some places that were familiar have disappeared. Others are larger, and the clothes are different. She wanders from country to country, wishing she had been left to doze away her life in her thicket where life was peaceful and simple._

_In some city in a far part of the world, she looks up from her drink to see the pedlar woman who gave her the apple. And the woman – Matska, her name is - takes her by the arm and tells her the story of how she was once given an apple to eat by a very wise, very old woman. She closed her eyes and when she opened them again, there was a new world. How lonely she has been since that day._

_When they kiss, it is like Lola is back in her forest and everything else has faded away. She can hear every part of Matska's body with a precise love. The gentle rustling of her hair falling around Lola's face, the hissing of her breath indrawn when Lola touches her, the thundering of her blood when she mounts her.  
_

* * *

The world swims back into view, and Lola emerges from her dream of apples. She is lying on the bed with Mattie curled round her. Her blouse has lost its top few buttons, and her neck and chest are stained with smears of dry blood. Mattie's mouth is bloody, too, her red lips pressed against Lola's shoulder.

“I dreamed,” says Lola. Mattie does not move or open her eyes, but she is awake and replies.

“Did you learn anything from your dream?”

“Should I have?” Lola turns to face her.

“What use if not, Lola?” She stirs, opens her eyes, and props herself on the pillow. “Did it try to tell you anything?”

She lies there in silence for a while, thinking. The draught from the winter outside curls through the room and over the bare parts of her chest. Mattie watches with quiet eyes as Lola inspects the extent of the bloodstains. Slowly she begins to unbutton the remains of her blouse, and draws the front apart so that her white stomach gleams in the shaft of sunlight. Mattie moves a hand to stroke her.

Mattie's limbs are smooth and toned when Lola pulls her out of her dress. She can trace the lines of the muscles beneath the skin all the way from the hollow between her breasts down to the sharp bones of her hips. Lola takes her time at first, but Mattie's cries when she finally settles in with her tongue drive any remaining shyness away. Her fingers twine tightly into Lola's thick curly hair and urge her on, her hips rolling and shuddering.

Mattie's own tongue on her refuses to have mercy. She tears moans from Lola's throat as she brings her closer and closer to the brink, but always draws back at the last moment. Finally, Lola's world shrinks to the size that Mattie's mouth has made for it and there are babbled words coming from her mouth, incoherencies of name and pleading. 

Mattie smirks, and fingers replace her tongue while she turns her head to kiss the inside of Lola's thigh. She feels the fangs come out again and the ragged breaths she draws waiting for the bite are so long. And then Mattie is tearing into her flesh again, fingers pumping inside her as her fangs sink through the skin of Lola's leg-

* * *

Perry sits bolt upright in bed, her heart hammering. Her breathing is deep and rapid. Every part of her body is on fire, and she slams a hand against her neck half-expecting to find puncture wounds and crusts of dried blood. There are none, and none on the inside of her leg either. But while the slick wetness between her thighs may not be blood, it is no phantom either. Nor is the almost painful fire in her nipples.

She flicks the light on, avoiding any accidental glance at her eyes in the mirror. A few minutes with her head in her hands calms her heart rate, but the arousal is not going away. The memory of Matska Belmonde's supple body, her hands everywhere, her teeth...

She lunges for her waistband.

Even after Perry has abandoned all her clothes and taken the edge off with her own hand, stifling her moans face down into the pillow (but Matska's touch was more subtle than her own frustrated efforts to finish things as soon as possible), the tide of feeling will not go away.

She doesn't understand why the biting is so alluring. The sex, that makes a sort of sense (and she tries to ignore the implication that at some point she accepted sexual obsession with Matska Belmonde as 'sense'), but the biting? It couldn't really be like that though. Not in real life.

Exhausted, she doesn't bother to put her clothes back on before sinking into blackness once more.


	4. Tooth and Claw

Perry is naked under the covers as she surrenders to exhaustion. She can smell her own sweat from the frenzy of the previous dream. Outside, the soft sound of crunching indicated that something is moving around on the gravel path. A fox, maybe, or at any rate an animal...

* * *

The stones under her feet are sharp and as her stumbling journey continues, her thin and fragile shoes offer less and less protection. Two miles back, where she left the shattered ruins of her carriage, the way had not seemed so bad but after staggering along the gravelly hill road for an hour the flimsy city slips were barely there. She had hoped to find somebody by now.

Would it have been better to stay at the crash site? She is not sure. The driver had been thrown from his seat into the ravine and there was no rescuing him; the horses were either dead or shortly to be so; and the remains of the carriage itself would be no good as shelter. But maybe there had been some wanderer not far off to hear the wreck and she should have stayed in case they arrived to investigate. Too late to worry about that now.

There is one small sign of progress. She has come down from the heights of the hills where no trees grow in the howling wind, and walks now amid expanses of shrub and wind-blasted pines. A little further down – she will reach the edge in a moment - are the lower forest lands. Further on still, on the other side of the forest, are the homesteads and farms of civilisation that lead eventually to Milan.

The bag she is carrying is heavy, although she had the good sense to rearrange her possessions before striking out and she carries now a case of blankets and warm clothes. But no good shoes – winter in the city demands coats and hats for even the insides of carriages are cold, but solid boots are not fashionable. 

As she passes under the first huddled trees of the wood, she is plunged into darkness. The trunks are closely packed, their branches crossing overhead. Here are there fallen and half-fallen trees lean against each other. After a minute, her eyes adjust and she can see far enough to follow the road. But she also sees that there is a fork in the road, and that to her left a diverging path wanders off to lose itself in the dingy distance. As she approaches the fork she sees also that on either side of the side track, a plaque has been nailed to a tree. Both plaques bear the carved visage of a snarling, fanged face with the legend _La Bestia_ beneath.

A warning not to trespass from the owner? Or a warning not to venture from the locals?

Lola wonders whether the plaques mean that another house is to be found not far along the track. After consideration, she sets off down the path to _La Bestia_ , reasoning that even if she heads on to the lowlands she will not reach a settlement before dark and so loses nothing by trying. She tries not to consider too deeply whether the name might be an accurate description of whoever she might find at her destination. Most likely it is heraldic, she assures herself.

Her choice is rewarded by the sudden opening-up of the wood to reveal a great house scowling in a clearing. It is a rambling structure, in a mix of architectural styles and with wings thrown out on all directions. There is no light at first, but as she walks around a little, one appears in a window adjacent to a large studded door. Knocking at the door by the great iron knocker achieves nothing and raises no response. Cautiously she turns the handle and finds to her surprise that it creaks open onto a hallway bathed in light.

Here, everything is different from the forbidding exterior. There are clean wide flagstones on which are laid out deep Turkish rugs; there are elegant tables inlaid in patterns of different woods; there is a roaring fire to warm herself by. But more than that, too: as she draws close to the fire she finds that next to the leather armchair is a small table upon which is placed a plate of sandwiches and a bottle of wine. _Drink me_ , says a label around the bottle and _Eat me_ , says a note on the plate.

The sandwiches are filled with very rare beef, bloody and satisfying. The wine, too, is excellent and restores to her some spirit. As she eats and drinks, she periodically looks up to see if her unknown host has arrived. Nobody, however, appears. When she is done and wondering what to do next, she hears a low creak from behind her and discovers that one of the doors out of the hallway has opened. By this point she is so well-disposed towards the house that she does not hesitate to arise and go through. She finds herself in a corridor to which all the other doors are closed – but there is also a stairway lit up by gas lights. She mounts it, feet sinking into the luxuriant carpet.

At the top of the stairs she is not surprised to find a well-lit landing from which the one open door beckons her into a bedroom. The bed is a jewel of coloured cushions and covers, all hung around with embroidered velvet. But strangest of all is that on her bed lie three cases and a hat box: her luggage, abandoned at the crash of her own carriage. This sight makes her whip round, half-expecting that her host will be there laughing at her surprise. But nothing.

She is too grateful to ask questions at present. She tidies the cases off the bed, changes, and slips in. Her sleep is soon and deep, broken only by one brief awakening towards dawn when she thinks she can hear the floor above her creaking. But the trees are so close to the house that in truth it could be the wind tossing about a protesting pine.

The morning brings sun in through the thin curtains. Lola awakes, stretches, enjoys choosing which of her previously abandoned clothes to wear. On arriving downstairs in the hall, the expected breakfast is waiting for her on the fireside table. Hot brioche rolls, butter and jam, coffee. She eats hungrily, and is barely finished when the clopping of hooves and snorting of horses alerts her to the presence of an arrival outside. She opens the door to find a carriage standing there, door open and her luggage tied securely to the rack. 

It is with some sadness that she understands her hospitality to be over, but of all the ends to her tale she considered when emerging from her wreck yesterday, this is better beyond all hope. She tugs the door shut behind her and is about to mount up when she spies with pleasure the rose bushes blooming around the door. It had been too dark, and she too exhausted, to see them last night. They are such superb blooms, and so strangely out of season that she is impelled to pluck one – a memento of her most generous invisible host.

But with a baying and howling, each window in the house lights up, the horses rear and break into flight and the slamming open of the front door reveals the snarling face of the owner of the house, _La Bestia_. She snatches the white flower from Lola's hand.

“My good, er, ma'am -” stammers Lola, but the response is a renewed roar.

“I am none of that. I am the Beast and you must call me Beast while I call you Thief!” Her mouth is full of sharp teeth, and the hand which she gestures angrily at Lola's face ends in inch long claws.

“Forgive me for robbing your garden, Beast!”

The Beast seizes her by the chin and pulls her close, so that Lola can feel her breath. She hangs from the creature's grip like that for a second, the Beast stating intently into her eyes, before she is unceremoniously dropped on the ground, and the Beast stalks back into her house.

“Take the rose, then. But stay to dinner.” 

***

As the light begins to dim, there is a knock at her door and while she is still deciding whether to open it, it is opened for her and a thin, nervous-looking man with dark hair and straggly beard steps in.

“I am J.P., the housekeeper here,” he says with a slight bow. “I have brought you a gift to wear to dinner.” And he pulls in after him a wheeled rack bearing a great dress of white satin. Other items are folded on the base of the rack – shoes, stockings, jewellery.

“I'm to wear this?” Lola asks incredulously. 

“Yes. The Mistress insists.” His manner is neat, pedantic.

“What is she?” He looks at her for a moment with unfathomable pale eyes.

“Nothing human lives here,” he states precisely, and Lola says no more. He turns to go.

“My name is Lola,” she calls after him. “She didn't ask.”

She looks with some dislike at the confection of a dress. All puffed sleeves and fussy decorations, it is a mountain of artificiality. No doubt it will amuse the Beast to have this unreal ornament on the other side of the table. Lola dresses, feeling for the first time in her life a detestation for finery. In the middle of this wind-blasted forest it seems petty, even presumptuous.

As an afterthought, she winds the white rose she took from the garden into her hair. Several petals have already come off, and in her nervous flight back to her room she shredded several more, but it is still a beautiful bloom.

She finds the dining room by passing through the doors that have been opened for her – no doubt by the unassuming but inhuman housekeeper. The room is long, black and white tiled floor leading up to a great fireplace. In front of the fire is laid a trestle table of heavy wood, and two places set in equally heavy wooden chairs. The Beast is already seated. With her mouth is closed and her hands folded in her lap, she looks almost human. She is even beautiful, now that Lola has seen her not snarling. But her dark features and wild black hair seem a fit with the heavy reality of the room. Lola's white insubstantiality drifts like a cloud.

To her amazement, the Beast bursts into a smile as she takes her seat and extends a hand.

“My name is Matska,” she says.

“Lola,” she replies.

“I know.”

They are silent as J.P. wheels in the food - all courses at once, with spirit lamps to keep the later dishes warm. To Lola he serves game soup, soufflé, a joint of rabbit: all superbly cooked. But to Matska he brings raw meat – a plucked quail, lumps of raw and bloody liver, slices of steak done up with pepper. It is all presented with the same finesse as Lola's more conventional foods, but it is without the slightest cooking. To Lola's relief, Matska eats with knife and fork and does so neatly and slowly.

As she eats, she tells Lola about her life on the edge of the forest. The scrublands and barren pines along the foothills of the mountains all belong to her, and it is here she hunts her quarry. Everything that wanders into her land is her legitimate prey – she beams at Lola while saying this – but she has a custom to be hospitable to those who arrive at her door.

Her story moves on to the strange wanderers, creatures like her, who wander through the world. She has a sister, a dark-haired, pale-faced beauty who haunts the mountains of Styria. She tells a tale of she and her sister running through the streets of a city in far Indochina, laughingly pursuing each other into alleys and courtyards.

In the chaotic years early in the century a French army had passed through the forest on the way to battle the Austrians. A company had billeted themselves here, and she had amused herself by playing the unseen hostess and leaving a soft, teasing note for the captain which he placed in his breast pocket and bore until the day he died, ragged-coated in the Russian snow.

As she chatters on, her face increasingly animated, Lola watches her shining eyes. Her stories pass in and out of the world Lola knows – a city here, a famed figure there – and seem to draw it all together in a new pattern, one unimagined until now.

When dessert comes – crème brulee for Lola and, unexpectedly, the same for Matska – it is Lola's turn to try to speak about her life. But it all seems to fade to insignificance in the face of the Beast's telling of her life and days. She manages a summary: her migratory life between Milan and Florence, the balls, the operas, the buying of fripperies and the wearing of the same only to grow bored of them before the season is out. The friends who are also rivals – and, most precious, the rivals who are also friends. The young men who wanted to kiss her and whom she refused; the young women who wanted to kiss her and whom she accepted. The manicured nails striking again and again on the gold bars of the birdcage.

The meal over, Matska stands and Lola follows suit. They face each other across the chessboard floor.

“Now darling,” says the Beast, “We have had a lovely evening, but there is unfinished business between you and I. Will you pay me for my rose?” Lola's hand shoots to the flower still in her hair. There are only a few petals left, the heat from the fire having wilted what remained of it.

“Name the price and I will pay it,” Lola replies.

“I would see you out of that dress.”

Lola starts at the demand. She had expected, with all Matska's generosity, some token to apologise for taking that which was not offered. She shakes her head, watching closely the Beast's dark eyes.

“You said you would pay me, Lola,” she purrs, advancing slowly. Again Lola shakes her head and backs away.

“Why?” she manages to stutter out.

Matska grins a mouth full of teeth and opens her arms wide. “You are an ornament far surpassing that rose. Pay it back – with interest, you might say.”

“No.”

“No?” Matska echoes her, then sighs. “If you will not, then I will.” And she hooks her clawed hands under the straps of her dress and with one twist, severs them. The silk flows down to the floor and Lola can see now that she had worn nothing underneath and has no shoes. She is as beautiful out of the dress than in it, her body lithe and strong. Muscles flow beneath the skin as she paces toward her, and Lola feels a momentary desire to yield if that would allow her to touch Matska.

“Now, Lola? Fair's fair.” 

“It's not decent.” She swallows.

“We're not in decent places now, darling. We're in the place you brought us to.” Matska laughs, an oddly happy sound for such a creature. 

“Why play this game?”

Matska shrugs and ignores the question. “What's waiting for you out there, Lola? Want to be an doll back in the make-believe city because you were too scared to come to life here?”

“This isn't real,” she retorts.

“Of course it is. Oh darling, you don't think your little world of pretty dresses and balls is real, do you?” She seizes Lola suddenly by the neck, her claws pressing into the soft skin. 

“You're a monster,” she whispers, and then an expression of fury passes over Matska's face and she realises she has said the wrong thing.

“I am _La Bestia_!” she proclaims. “And you, Lola, owe me for my rose. Will you pay the price I ask?”

Lola shakes her head one last time.

Matska bites her, the fangs penetrating deep in Lola's neck and she falls to the floor. Inside herself, Lola can feel the stilling of her heart and the silencing of her arteries. Out onto the floor leaks her blood, all the blood that fuelled her life in the world. But as she lies there, breathing out the last of her life, she feels arms come around and bear her up. Matska's face presses against hers and it is wet with tears that run down her cheek and into her mouth. Matksa is crying, rocking her and trying to say something. The salt taste of tears on her tongue stings.

Shakily she stands. Matska scrabbles back in shock. She stretches her arms, the joints opening out into new life, and gazes with amazement at her hands. It is incredible to her now that she has kept her fingers so clenched before, but now she flexes them. With extended claws she takes her bloodstained dress by the neck and tears it off. The shoes too, and the stockings, and everything else that was her skin in the world. Finally she pulls the remains of the rose from her hair and throws it to the ground. There are no petals left on the bare stem.

“Nothing human lives here,” she tells Matska, and extends her fangs for the first time.

Matska approaches slowly, her eyes still bright with tears and she presses a hand to Lola's cheek. Then, taking her shoulders as if to start a dance, she bares her neck. Lola hesitates only briefly before biting down, feeling the blood running down her throat and sending blissful streams of satisfaction-

* * *

“You've been dreaming very loudly tonight, Lola,” says the voice of Matska Belmonde from the middle of the room.


	5. Night and Day

Lola is sitting upright in bed, clutching the blankets to her chest as she shrinks against the wall.

“You've been dreaming very loudly tonight,” repeats Matksa. “Don't you know what that does to a girl's head? All that kissing and biting.”

“What are you-” she begins, but Matska flicks the bedside light on and interrupts.

“Don't play dumb with me darling,” she simpers, “I'm not some two-century débutante who can just about work out when their bedmate's having a nightmare, I have excellent oneiric perception. Which means that right now I have a problem involving all the second-hand lust you're broadcasting.” As Lola's eyes adjust to the brightness she takes in the short dressing gown of red silk that Matska is wearing and swallows.

“I don't know what you're talking about,” she claims, fiddling with the covers thrown over her bare body.

“I do think your characterisation of me leaves something to be desired though,” Matska continues as if she has said nothing. “I mean the wolf-woman was all right if we leave aside the fact that it's not wolves that are my animal, and I'd be lying if I denied ever seducing someone at a party – but Sleeping Beauty? Really, darling!The Beast wasn't too bad in outline, I suppose... but the lines you had me say! Downright grotesque.” She laughs.

“They weren't exactly under my control,” protests Lola.

“Didn't stop you enjoying them, did it? Oh, don't think I can't tell,” she adds. “Don't forget my room is precisely over yours, and I have vampiric hearing. All that moaning, and sighing - and I can smell how you've been stewing in your own juices. As far as my nose is concerned you've doused yourself in lust-scented perfume.” Lola colours and tries to pull the covers tighter around her. 

“What the _fuck_ do you want with me?” she spits out.

Matska stretches her long arms and turns a slow circle in the middle of the room before replying. “Oh, like I said. That stuff works its way into a girl's mind. Especially when the one beaming it out it starts gasping my name into her pillow while she diddles herself. So I thought I'd come see if you needed a, hm, helping hand this time round.”

Lola stares at her.

“Lost your tongue, little girl? Surely you're not that easily shocked. Let's face it, Lola - under the prim-and-proper, you're a bit twisted. Be honest. If I hadn't arrived, would you or would you not be having another go at getting yourself off to the mental image of your lewd imaginings?” She tugs at the closure of he gown and Lola catches shadowy hints of her body.

The teasing is a bit too on point for comfort. That is exactly what she would be doing. And the little intrusive voice in the back of her head – the one whispering _jump off_ on the edge of a cliff or _drop it_ when carrying something fragile – is telling her that she could, right now, just throw the covers aside and let Matska do what she would with her. Lola's hands twitch, but she keeps hold of the blanket. _Fall on your knees in front of her_ says the urge, but she keeps control.

“This isn't real,” she whispers. “This is another dream. Yes: I'm dreaming again.” It must be a dream. In real life, Matska Belmonde wouldn't be propositioning her. In real life, she wouldn't be finding the concept attractive.

“I wish you were. Dream Perry is much more inclined to finish what her subconscious started.”

Matska comes to the edge of the bed and leans forward. Stray strands of her piled hair fall loose around her face and Lola is immediately conscious of how close her lips are. This isn't a dream. Her thoughts run too fast, there is too much reflexive scurrying in the back of her head for this. 

“You don't even like me, Ms. Belmonde.”

“Darling,” she sighs, “I'm not here to bask in your easy-going personality. And call me Mattie.”

“I don't like you, either. You're a monster.”

“I'm not suggesting you write an essay commending my principled moral outlook either.” She smiles toothily, and ends it by biting gently at her own lip. Something snaps inside Lola.

“I suppose, Mattie,” she begins slowly, her eyes fixed on her face, “that my sending you away would just result in a very frustrating night followed by an endless tide of snide remarks for as long as we're in this house?”

“I suppose.” She sits sideways on the bed.

“And I suppose,” she continues, “that if this were to happen again on another night you might be less sympathetic?”

“I suppose.” Mattie lifts a hand and runs her finger down Lola's cheek.

“And I suppose that being afraid of you killing me isn't sensible, since you could as easily have done it on any other occasion?”

“I suppose.”

First Mattie's lips are on hers, and then there are hands cupping her face, and her tongue making forays into her mouth. And Lola feels herself relaxing into the embrace, her own arms pulling Mattie in, pushing down the covers that intrude between them. She is spiralling down quickly, the pent-up teasing of four dreams coming to the fore and she locks her legs around Mattie's waist as they kiss.

The dressing-gown Mattie wears is thin, but it is too thick for her liking. Lola tugs it off, running kisses down her shoulders, her arms, her breasts. Then back up to her waiting mouth and taking Mattie by her fine hair, pulls her down so that they lie one on top of the other - Lola's hips finding some part of her to grind against.

“Getting into this, darling?”

“Didn't hear you complaining.”

“Life is too long to not enjoy oneself, darling. Speaking of which, it's time to play a game.” Mattie rolls off her, lying sideways on the bed and placing a hand on Lola's bare stomach.

“A game?” She would much rather have continued the previous course of action.

“Something to your twisted taste, I hope. Get up!” Mattie grabs her discarded dressing gown and throws it at her. The red silk is longer on Lola than on Mattie, but it still does not come down as far as her knees.

“Now, Lola. I think I left a favourite ring on the dressing table in my room. Could you be a dear and fetch it please?” 

Lola looks at her curiously. LaFontaine has occasionally declared that minor domestic chores would be her equivalent of foreplay, but that was (presumably) meant as a joke.

“Off you go. Oh, and by the way – be careful of who you meet on the path.” She smirks and the penny drops in Lola's head. 

She closes the door behind her after leaving the room and much as she expected hears the sound of her curtains being drawn aside and the bedroom window being opened. There are two staircases she could use to reach the next floor where Mattie's room is. If she turns right, she can take the interior route, which will pass fewer windows and not many empty rooms – but she will also be walking past occupied bedrooms and she does not like the idea of being discovered padding down the corridor in the small hours dressed only in Mattie's clothes by LaFontaine or J.P . But the other staircase will have more ways for Mattie to intercept her. 

She wonders what the point of the game is. Does she want to be ambushed quickly (and often)? Or is the fun in putting off the inevitable? What would Red Riding Hood do?

She feels like a stranger as she tiptoes through the house. She steps slowly, deliberately, pausing whenever the floorboards begin to creak and feeling every snag and imperfection in the carpet. The wide bay windows around the staircase look out onto the night. Bare trees wave in the gentle wind, and one or two buildings on the campus have lit windows. She wonders what people are doing in them, and whether anyone looking out at this very moment would guess her own activities.

She can still taste Mattie on her lips. Something of her warm, woody scent clings to the gown she now wears, and Lola is insistently conscious of her own nakedness under its flimsy covering. Each beat of her heart seems to tie together the smaller thrummings – the pulse in her neck, the subtle movements of blood in her fingertips, the longing tugging between her legs.

 _Of course,_ says the small sensible voice in the back of her head, _Mattie can hear you two floors off. But this is a game, so she'll give you a chance._

Stepping carefully on the edges of the stairs to avoid creaking, she creeps her way up to the next floor, slips neatly into the first bedroom and hides behind the door. _Maybe you should entertain yourself while you're waiting_ , she thinks. _Throw yourself on the bed, wait to her to find you spread out and ready._

In the silence, she imagines herself in the forest of her dream. She is behind a tree, bare-footed Matska stalking through the undergrowth. Only this time there's no village to run back to if she finds she is awaited at grandmother's cottage.

After a minute's silence, footsteps pace along the corridor outside towards her: the big bad wolf is hunting. _Lift up the latch and walk in_. They come to a pause right outside Lola's door, then turn around and go back the other way.

Lola peeps through the hinges. Assuming Mattie isn't walking backwards, she could dash to the room on the other side. The rooms on this corridor have doors offset from each other – by running quickly from one side to the other she could zig-zag her way up to Mattie's room. She takes a breath, waits until the footfalls are almost to the other end of the corridor, and makes a break for it.

The next room is a drawing-room of some sort – scattered little tables and comfortable chairs. But there is also a second door, leading off parallel to the corridor. The footsteps are coming down the passage again and she scuttles towards it, pressing herself against the papered surface as they get closer. She tries the handle and sighs with relief when it is quiet. She hears Mattie stop moving.

There is a knocking – not at her room, but to one further up, followed by the brushing sound of a door moving over carpet. And then again, only this time at the door of the room she is about to move into. When it has faded, Lola throws caution away and throws herself as fast as she can into the next room – a small anteroom. She waits to hear Mattie hammering at the drawing-room entrance, but nothing happens.

“Well, my dear,” says the big bad wolf from right behind her, “did we forget that you can knock on both sides of a door?” Arms slide around Lola's waist, and through the thin silk of the gown she can feel that Mattie is still naked. Her warm, spicy scent envelops her.

“Should I pay a forfeit?” she asks. Mattie chuckles.

“You're sounding a bit too keen on that, Lola. A girl might get to thinking that you enjoy being prey.”

Lola does not reply, but turns round slowly, keeping herself pressed against Mattie's body. Then, gently, she sinks to her knees. 

_All the better to eat you with._

Mattie's stance does not stagger or waver, even when Lola's tongue takes her over the edge and she cries out, thrusting her hips forward, fingers tangled in Lola's hair.

She sags back, mouth covered in Mattie, and looks up. Mattie's hands cup her head, and Lola feels each finger on her face as a separate presence. The hands draw her up to stand again, and crush her lips against Mattie's.

“What time is it?” Mattie asks, leaning to look at a clock on a side table. “Hmm. Three o'clock.” She looks back at Lola. “Well past the time you should have been back from the ball, Cinders.” 

“You're enjoying this far too much.”

“So are you. Oh, and you can get rid of that scrap of cloth,” she adds. “the ball-gown turns back into rags when the clock chimes, remember?” Lola shrugs off the dressing gown.

“-three hours late, Lola,” says Mattie.

She realises what is expected of her. “Sorry, ma'am, I-”

“No excuses, girl. Sit there.” She indicates the side table. “Spread your legs.” Mattie drops off the table and plants herself between Lola's thighs. 

_I'm not meant to be doing this_ , Lola suddenly thinks. _This doesn't fit into my life._

 _Darling_ , replies the voice from her Cinderella dream, _'meant to be doing' means nothing unless you are the one doing the meaning. Give it up, whatever it is._

She gives up, and melts into Mattie's kiss. Her lips are intoxicating, and Lola moans into them as fingers set to work. They part, and push, and pump through her slick folds, the pleasure blossoming up through her body in waves, mounting up until-

Mattie pulls away.

“No. You don't come yet. Three hours late, Lola – that's three climaxes forfeited.” She takes hold of her chin with soaked fingers. “We'll let you come away from the brink for a moment, and then...”

The second time is harder and each pump of Mattie's fingers, each circle made by her thumb, draws its cry from Lola's throat. She collapses forward over the woman's shoulders when she is brought up short once again, gasping.

“It really was very wicked of you to keep me waiting, dear”, Mattie whispers in her ear. Lola presses a kiss to her cheek.

The third time is agony, and Lola has long since lost the ability to control her responses. Shuddering, almost crying, she feels herself rippling under Mattie's touch only to have it once more withdrawn.

“Oh, my poor girl,” Mattie croons. “I have such a temper – can you possibly forgive me?” Lola manages a breathy chuckle, which dissolves into moans as Mattie starts once more. This time she does not stop, and Lola crests the wave of pleasure with her kisses planted on Mattie's shoulder turning to biting and smothered incoherent cries.

* * *

“You are vicious,” Lola tells her once she's got her breath back. The two of them lie next to each other on the Lola's bed, the floor of the ante-room having proved unsuitably scratchy.

“No more vicious than you dreamed me, darling.” Mattie stretches. “And what does that say about you, I wonder?” She inspects the hickey on her shoulder and smirks.

“In my dream-” she begins but stops short, suddenly afraid.

“In your dream?” Mattie prompts.

“You bit me. And it, was, um, very good.” She shifts her position. “But it's not really like that, right?” Mattie smiles wide and Lola sees with a tremor her white fangs extend.

“Do you want to find out?” she asks.

The minutes that have calmed her heartbeat and breathing since Mattie took her are erased to nothing, and Lola feels the thumping in her chest and the deep breaths coming back. The memory of the dream is tangible, the sleeping beauty awakening to impale her flesh on pinpoint fangs and suck ragged cried from her mouth.

“Will I survive?”

“Yes, dear. I don't lose control.”

She remembers the dream of Mattie as Sleeping Beauty. _Are you always curious about things that might hurt you?_

_You know how people will tell you the plate is hot and you shouldn't touch it? And then you touch it to see if they were right?_

“Well, I-” she begins.

“Lola. You remember the point where I shared the dream with you and was then distinctly able to hear you rubbing yourself off to the memory? Are you seriously going to play coy right now?” Her words take hold of strings somewhere in Lola's body and pull them exquisitely.

“Bite me, then.” Mattie nuzzles her cheek, makes a non-committal noise. “Please bite me.” Saying it aloud convinces her, excites her. “Do it.”

The fangs do hurt at first, and she wonders whether she has overestimated what vampiric biting might be capable of, but then Mattie begins to feed and she lets out a guttural sound at how good it feels. Every part of her is shot through with pleasure, all drawn up like a deep breath into the vampire's mouth and then gushing back again in a wave of arousal ready for the next. She curls herself as tight around Mattie as she can, urging her on, pushing her inwards. And then shaking, Lola grabs one long-fingered hand and guides it between her legs to spasm against, the movements Mattie's mouth matching the circling on her clit.

“Again,” she gasps when Mattie withdraws.

Mattie wears a look of smug satisfaction. “You liked it, then?”

“Again.” And when the fangs cut through the other side of her neck and the whole of her body explodes with agonised pleasure, Lola wonders happily what price Mattie will extort for this.

* * *

“Look in the mirror, Lola.”

She is slumped on the floor. Every part of her is tired. Every part has been wound to the point of maximum tension, and then played in Mattie's expert style. The vampire sits behind her, Lola lolling in her lap.

She looks in the mirror. The beginnings of dawn are showing, a grey light seeping into the room from the window. The girl who looks back at her has wide eyes – _crazy eyes_ , says a voice in her head. Her hair is a mess, hanging in tangles. There are two puncture marks on each side of her neck, and smudges of dried blood over her chest and stomach. She looks like an extra from a horror film. She looks happy.

Even Mattie behind her shows some sign of tiredness. There is blood around her mouth, and though her face is much more composed than Lola's the normal ferocity in her eyes is muted, the fires banked. Her arms are wound around Lola's chest, firmly but not tightly.

“I reckon we're both Beauty,” she murmurs.

“That goes without saying, Bella. Who's the Beast?” 

She snorts. “You, obviously. You bit me.”

“Darling, it's in my nature. And don't pretend it's not in your nature to like it.”

Lola says nothing, only leans her head back to bump against Mattie's shoulder. She remembers watching a film version of Beauty and the Beast when she was younger and feeling oddly sorry for Beauty. She had fallen in love with a beast, only to find him changed into somebody completely different at the end. Maybe she was disappointed with the prince in comparison. After all, somebody who found themselves attracted to a wild thing of fang and fur had to have some beastliness in her make-up in the first place, didn't she? 

Mattie plants a kiss on her neck, her tongue flicking out to tease the ragged edges of her bite-mark. Lola giggles.

“Remember the moral to the original _La Petit Chaperon Rouge_?” Mattie asks.

"I don't think I actually know the original.”

“Charles Perrault's. One of the first collectors and authors of fairy tales, along with Jean de La Fontaine.” Lola stirs. “Yes, maybe an ancestor of your little friend - who knows? Anyway, he put nauseatingly earnest morals after many of his stories - I remember the Red Riding Hood one.”

 _Little girls, this seems to say_  
_Never stop along the way_  
_Never trust a stranger friend_  
_No-one knows how it will end_  
_As you're pretty, so be wise_  
_Wolves may lurk in every guise_  
_Now, as then, is simple truth:_  
_Sweetest tongue has sharpest tooth_

Lola considers this for a while.

“He says that like it's a bad thing.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'd like to bob a little curtsey in the direction of [imonlyheresoIdontgetfined](http://archiveofourown.org/users/imonlyheresoIdontgetfined/) whose splendid fic [Sugar Never Tasted So Good](http://archiveofourown.org/works/4251885/chapters/9622425) was an important inspiration for this piece.
> 
> Readers who enjoyed this fic may also be interested in my other Permonde piece, [Frumious](http://archiveofourown.org/works/5312081).


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